Everyone has an opinion

Dream Theater is in my top five favorite bands of all time. On Wednesday, the 29th, I was able to witness, in full glory, the Majesty that is DT. A quick hop from my house, the Chevy Theater (Oakdale) is a great place to see a show. It looks a little bit like ski lodge upon entering, but I found the layout to be quite managable, and our seats were in a perfect location; Section 100, in the handicap section. Apparently they release these seats, if they have not been purchased, the day of the show. If you can get these seats, I highly recommend them. No one in front of you, or to the sides of you. The seats are clustered in groups of two.

When the lights dimmed, the sound of a moog reverberated loudly. The Carlos classic title music from Kubrick’s film, A Clockwork Orange, gave the crowd due cause to erupt into cheer. What a magnificient way to open the show.

A slow crescendo leading up to The Root Of All Evil, and a mighty strike, Dream Theater was executing complete grace. I was certainly not prepared fot the remainder of the set Having seen a couple hundred shows over the past sixteen years, I have learned to set my expectations pretty low. This holds especially true when seeing a band I hold in such high regard. I have seen many great bands live in concert, who sound fantastic on their albums, fall flat in a live scenario. Thankfully, I was completely taken back with the guys in DT. Their audiophile approach to sound, was evident and a welcome suprise. Their volume was set at a near perfect level, with two minor exceptions. Petrucci’s guitar on a few songs rang in a tad low. I noticed him signaling to the side of the stage a few times, and this was corrected a few measures later. Myung’s bass is far too low. Unless he is leading a melody section, it is farily difficult to enjoy his playing. It tends to get lost in the mix a bit, which is sad; He is truley an articulate, and amazing player.

The show continued on with, the band taking careful note of their 20 year career; They played great pieces from each album’s period, lush arrangements, and m any of these songs, deep tracks. Witnessing the band perform these songs live was truely a great event.

Let me address the Drum Solo. I am not a drummer, however, I sincerely wish I was; this was the type of performance that drummers live for. The drum solo was, bar none, the most enjoyable that I have seen (A close second being Morgenstein and Van Romaine duet during a Dregs show). Jason Bitter (voted Modern Drummer’s best up and coming drummer in 2004) hopped up on stage to join portnoy in a completely satisfying drum duet that encompassed DT, Zeppelin, Van Halen, Maiden, Pantera, Slayer and many others. They ended the performance with Moby Dick and Tom Sawyer. Bonham and Peart would be proud. Bittner’s own comments (his current career highlight) can be read at Blabbermouth. Petrucci helped the effort by providing some killer guitar work to assist the guys. After which, they took a much needed break for an intermission.

The remainder of the show leading up to the show’s closer, was phenomenal. A great choice of songs, a definte highlight was the audience singing Home.

Octavarium.

The definitive highlight of the show. Bar none. Rudess proves that he is perhaps the most versitile musician in the band, but perhaps the best modern rock musician.  This was absolutely incredible.
My wife lumps DT in a category she lovingly refers to as Genius Music. This title stretchs from DT to Zappa, Yes, Keneally, to King Crimson… Pretty much anything that has long winded musical passages, strange time signatures, and obnoxious fantasy lyrics. She maintains that either you are a pretencious genius, or a blathering idiot musician to enjoy a chromatic run that takes 15 minutes to explore. There is a bit of truth to this. I tend to think that only snobby musicians and psuedo-intellectuals will sit down and enjoy Thrak, or Nonkertompf; and unfortauntely, both will do it for the wrong reason. It’s not the technical ability, and sheer musicianship that makes these records grand. It’s not the ability to toss obscure references and exude your musical dominance at people whilst nursing that triple mocha red-eye at the coffee shop.

At the core, it is great music. Vast sonic pastures, with complete aural soundscapes (how’s that for pretencious). Let me put it in better terms – Great melodies, great harmonies and a great chorus make for lasting, memorable songs. I was joking about the genius music with Randy when we first arrived at the show. I was halfway expecting to find a sea of music nerds, proudly brandishing their tama, and EBMM shirts, or one step better – opening up that musty box to pull out that 2112 shirt from the original tour. What I found not only whoops my wife’s theory on DT falling into some snobby music category, it completely destroys it. The song was populating by musicians, death metal guys, punks, older ladies, and families. This was such a great site. I saw one guy, accompanied by his four kids, roughly around ten years old. The kids were fully decked out in DT gear. This gave me hope. My kids continually express an interest to listen to rock in the car, a good portion of the time, I put Dream Theater in for them. They like it. It’s interesting, multilayered music. This is the highest compliment I can give the guys from DT, they ahve created music that is edgy enough to be enjoyed by the biggest music snob, technical enough to appease the hardcore musician, and simple enough that children can listen to it and build a foundation for music with it. My hats go off to you guys. Thank you for the magnificient show.